Spool knitting or French knitting is a form of knitting that uses a spool with a number of pegs and a chrochet needle/loom hook to knit a tube from yarn. Many articles can be made from the resulting tube. For example, the tube can be wound in a spiral to produce mat, rug, etc. If a larger spool with more nails is used, a sock or a hat could be knitted.
In the past different techniques and tools of spool knitting have been used. A typical knitting spool has a tubular body with a through hole and number of yarn engaging members fixed on one end face of the spool. The yarn engaging members extend out from the end face of the spool. The spool is adapted to be easily held by one hand. A length of yarn is looped around a post using a loom hook or a chrochet needle or the like, etc. Yarn is, in turn, looped over each post to knit the yarn. There are several known knitting techniques to knit a tube. The number and shape of the yarn engaging members fixed on the spool may also vary for different techniques. During the knitting operation, knitted portion of the tube comes out from the hole in the tubular body at the end which is opposite to fixed yarn engaging members.
The knitting spool can also be used to knit a tube around an article. However, the article has to be placed in the hole of the spool to knit a tube around the article before starting the knitting operation. If the article has attachments at the end which cannot be inserted in the hole of the knitting spool, then a tube cannot be knit around the article. Therefore, there is a need for a knitting spool which can knit tube around an article with end attachments bigger than the hole of the knitting spool.
Also, different knitting techniques require different number of yarn engaging member on the knitting spool. Shape of the yarn engaging members is also different with different techniques and yarn properties. Therefore, separate knitting spools are required for different yarns and techniques. This can become cumbersome, especially if different articles are needed to be knitted by the same knitting spool. Thus, there remains a pressing need, where a single spool knitter can be used to knit articles of different shape and sizes.